1. Technical Field
The present disclosure relates to drawers with face panels mounted to move with the drawers, and more particularly relates to assemblies mounting the face panels to the drawer slides.
2. Background Information
Most drawers typically consist of a bottom surrounded by four upright members defining a back wall, two side walls, and a drawer front. The contents of the drawer can be accessed through an open horizontal plane defined generally by the upper margins of the back wall and two side walls. To facilitate such access, a drawer slide can be coupled to each side of the drawer and to each side of the drawer receiving opening in the cabinet holding the drawer. Each drawer slide consists generally of a first rail that is designed to be fixed to the side of the drawer and a second rail that is designed to be fixed to the cabinet. The first and second rails are coupled to each other by inter-engaging surfaces such a glides or bearings that facilitate relative movement between the two rails. A wide variety of such drawer slides exist that are suitable for use to permit drawers to move smoothly and easily in and out of cabinetry, particularly cabinetry typically found in kitchens.
Some drawers have a different construction from that previously described. In particular, some drawers, for example drawers typically situated in under-counter cabinets that include one or more waste containers. An example is to be found in Ward et al. U.S. Pat. No. 8,091,971, the entirety of which is hereby incorporated by reference. The drawer consists of a bottom designed to support the waste containers, and may include a back wall, and side walls for maintaining the waste container in an upright position. To facilitate access, drawer slides can be coupled to an under structure supporting the drawer bottom and to the bottom of the drawer receiving opening in the cabinet holding the drawer. A soft-close mechanism can be included in the understructure supporting the drawer bottom. A drawer front wall may be provided that includes provisions for interchangeably mounting a decorative face panel designed to match any adjacent cabinetry. Desirably the mounting is designed to adjustably mount the face panel to the drawer so that when the drawer is closed, the drawer face panel is in flush contact with the front surface of the cabinet enclosure and into desired height, pitch, roll, lateral and skew positions with respect to the front surface of the enclosure.
More recently, there has been a desire to provide such drawers that are lighter so that they can be move inward and outward with greater ease. There has also been a desire to provide such drawers that are more easily cleaned to ensure good hygiene in food preparation areas and other situations where such built in waste disposal drawer systems are employed. There has been a desire to mold portions of such drawers from anti-bacterial polymers.